TO REALLY, REALLY REST!

By Rabbi Nissim Lagziel

A JOKE TO BEGIN WITH…

“I h-h-heard th-th-that y-y-you c-c-can h-h-help m-m-me,” said the stutterer to the speech therapist. “Indeed,” answered the therapist, “sit back and relax in the chair, look straight into my eyes and count slowly to ten.”

The client began to count, “w-w-w-one, t-two, th-three, four, five, six, seven, eight,  nine, ten. Awesome, I don’t stutter anymore!”

“Well done,” answered the therapist as he began walking the man to the door. “The cost of the treatment is five hundred dollars.”

“W-w-w-what???”

***

This

week, we read Parashas Noach which, as the name indicates, is the story of Noach and his sons, mainly revolving around the events of the Mabul, the preparations for it (Hashem’s commandment for him to build a teiva) and the new post-flood world. At the end of the parasha there is a description of the Tower of Bavel which was never completed and the birth of the first Jew, Avrohom Avinu.

The parasha begins with the words, “These are the offspring of Noach, Noach was an ish tzaddik, tamim haya b’dorosav – a righteous man, perfect in his generations.” Those sharp-eyed individuals among us will have surely taken note of the seemingly odd wording. The repetition (“Noach Noach”) requires an explanation, particularly taking into account that the Torah has no extra word (or letter)! Why does his name need to be written twice? Have we started stammering?

The Medrash Raba (at the beginning of the parasha) explains that Noach’s name represents rest, inner calm and serenity. The Torah repeats his name in order to teach us that Shabbos, the day of rest of every Jew is divided into two levels of rest. This is why it is necessary, this one time, to write the name Noach twice.

The mitzva of Shabbos has a special and deep connection with the true and complete Geula. Everyone knows the famous Talmudic line, “If Yisrael kept two Shabbosos according to halacha, they would be redeemed immediately (Shabbos 118b).” Over the years, this has been explained in a myriad of ways by Torah greats who all try to explain the secret of Geula and how it is possible that observing (just!) two Shabbosos will make it happen.

It is interesting to note that in the Talmud Yerushalmi a similar line appears, similar but different … In the Yerushalmi it says, “If Yisrael observed one Shabbos properly, Ben Dovid would come,” At first glance, the two Talmuds are differing in the number of Shabbosos observed that would bring the Geula; the Bavli requires two while the Yerushalmi does the job quicker and suffices with one. We could analyze and debate at length the possible significance of this Talmudic contradiction, however, Chassidus explains that there actually is no disagreement because within every Shabbos there are two Shabbosos!

ON SHABBOS, A JEW IS MEANT TO FEEL TWO PLEASURES: ONE MATERIAL AND ONE SPIRITUAL

The body feels physical pleasure through the Shabbos meals, sleep, etc. while the spiritual pleasure is felt by the neshama in the longer davening and additional Torah study. Furthermore, in the holy Zohar and the writings of the Arizal we find an interesting division of the Shabbos day into two, Shabbos eve and Shabbos day – two different dimensions of spiritual elevation on Shabbos. Shabbos eve is called the “lower Shabbos” in the teachings of Kabbala, while Shabbos day is called the “upper Shabbos.”

What are these two Shabbosos and how can we sense, live and feel them? And how does all this lead to the Geula?

Consider a construction worker who works hard, from morning till night, for his living. Long days, backbreaking work, difficult conditions, make us exhausted, physically and spiritually. “I just can’t anymore …” When it is Shabbos evening, upon the commencement of Shabbos, we shake off that inner fatigue, remove our weekday clothes, wash and purify ourselves in honor of Shabbos, don a sirtuk and tie on a gartel and head for shul in an uplifted state.

Everyone knows that when he will return home he will sit at a royal feast carefully arranged with physical and spiritual delights (divrei Torah and niggunim). This inner knowledge frees us from the weekday world and opens a window to another world, a world of Geula! But this is just the beginning…

When a Jew gets up on Shabbos morning, he knows that it is not a workday, there are no phones, no chasing like a madman after one’s tail.  He experiences an entirely different sense of relaxation.

All that he has on this day is a maamar Chassidus, a lengthy tefilla, a Chassidishe farbrengen, niggunim and more. Shabbos morning, a Jew does not feel like someone running away from the weekday and shaking off the pull of physicality; he feels like a man born into holiness – innate restfulness.

This means that there are two types of menucha: 1) resting from activity – a rest in which a person still feels the hardships of work which preoccupy him, and he rises above it and is freed from it to rise to a higher level and 2) innate restfulness – a type of rest where, to begin with, there is nothing holding him back, which is why he only feels the sweetness of the good life.

Shabbos night, we experience the lower Shabbos (of every Shabbos). We free ourselves (mainly the body) from matters of the material world and from weekday activities. On Shabbos morning, we wake up to the higher Shabbos (of every Shabbos) to a good life and a good world which is loftier and more holy.

In order to be truly and utterly “redeemed,” a redemption of the soul and a redemption of the body, we need to observe  two Shabbosos… in one Shabbos (and in every Shabbos)! And this is what the Torah is hinting to us at the beginning of the Torah portion – Noach, Noach – in order to be redeemed from the “flood” that we live in, we need to keep Shabbos as a double Shabbos.

This Shabbos, when we read Parashas Noach, it is an opportunity to change how we relate to Shabbos, to want our home to have an atmosphere of holiness on Shabbos, that the meals be filled with Jewish content and the house run with a feeling of spiritual elevation. It is a time to commit to serious study of Chassidus and the avoda of tefilla on the Shabbos day, and to fill the time (and the internal storage bins) with spiritual content, so that we can finally be redeemed, once and for all!

TO CONCLUDE WITH A STORY

Actually more like a description of the Shabbos that a young Chassid experienced in the Rebbe’s proximity, in the years before the nesius:

It was right before Shavuos 5707/1947, in Paris.  The weather was downright awful, an intolerable heat wave. On that Friday, the Rebbe received a new volume of Chassidus that had just been published (possibly Hemshech “V’Kacha” 5637).

After Shacharis on Shabbos morning, the Rebbe sat down in the woman’s gallery that was stifling hot, wearing his hat, sirtuk and gartel, for six-seven hours straight without moving (!) until mincha. After mincha, a seuda shelishis meal was held in the shul, which the Rebbe did not partake from, but he did participate and say words of Torah for well over an hour!

After maariv and Havdala, two Jews approached the Rebbe. The first, an intellectual Jew, who asked for clear proof of the existence of the soul, and the second, a yeshiva bachur with a difficulty in understanding the words of a Tosafos in Bava Kama.  The Rebbe remained in the shul for a long time, explaining things to them and answering all of their questions, calmly and at length. All of this, despite the fact that the Rebbe, apparently, had not eaten anything all day. ■

And a “Good Shabbos” to you too!

Based on the maamar of the Rebbe, Eileh Toldos Noach 5751, and the sicha of Shabbos Parshas Noach 5752.